New Jerseyans aren’t always civil, but it’s still possible for a liberal Democrat and a conservative Republican to have a rational and pleasant conversation about politics in the state. Dan Bryan is a former senior advisor to Gov. Phil Murphy and is now the owner of his own public affairs firm, and Alex Wilkes is an attorney and former executive director of America Rising PAC who advises Republican candidates in New Jersey and across the nation, including the New Jersey GOP. Dan and Alex are both experienced strategists who are currently in the room where high-level decisions are made. They get together weekly with New Jersey Globe editor David Wildstein to discuss politics and issues.
We are now in Week 6 of the New Jersey governor’s race. Who won the week?
Alex Wilkes: Save for a forthcoming Lieutenant Governor announcement at the very end, July is for fireworks and fundraising. Still, you wouldn’t know it from Jack’s packed schedule!
I give the advantage to the Republicans this week because of the RNC’s lawsuit against the Division of Elections for failing to produce records about voting machines and voter roll maintenance. What a big surprise: Democrats who gutted ELEC and dismantled OPRA are now slow-walking information that rightfully belongs to the public!
In 2024, these lawsuits from the party were key to cleaning up the voter rolls in key places controlled by Democrats who had little incentive to do so. It shows that the national Republicans’ organized and persistent legal team has not taken its foot off the gas, which is a very good sign for Team Jack.
Dan Bryan: Outside of the Trenton bubble, it’s been a fairly mundane start to the general election. Neither campaign is doing much to change the current dynamic of the race, which is very good news for Congresswoman Sherrill, who begins the cycle with a huge lead.
We all like to follow the race day to day, picking apart their calendars and social media accounts, treating the election like a baseball game in the early innings. But nothing that happens publicly this summer will win or lose this election. The real campaign will play out on the airwaves, and most of that after Labor Day.
So both teams will stay busy publicly, but their focus will be on fundraising and strategizing for the fall. This is preseason.
Second-quarter fundraising numbers were filed this week. Who were the winners and losers?
Dan Bryan: CD7 Democrat Rebecca Bennett (whom I am thrilled to be working with) led the field again in Q2 – unless something shifts, she’s the favorite in the primary. And with good reason – her military background and broad appeal across the political spectrum are causing many sleepless nights at NRCC headquarters. There’s still a long way to go, and the primary field is getting more crowded by the day, but Bennett cemented her status as frontrunner with another quarter firmly in the fundraising lead.
Tom Kean will not be an easy out for Democrats. As disastrous as he is as a Congressman, he’s a good candidate with a strong team and solid funding. Democrats will need to bring their best if they want to flip the district, no matter how toxic the cycle is for the GOP.
Alex Wilkes: Congressman Tom Kean’s monster Q2 stuck out to me as a big win in a race that is attracting the attention of a number of Democrats. While Democrats spend the next year emptying their accounts and eating their own, Congressman Kean gets to keep building up his war chest.
I would say a big loss (for now – let’s wait to see Q3) for Republicans is a sluggish CD9. Republicans, backed by President Trump, should be able to easily stitch together his winning coalition in a district that he unexpectedly won. We can’t do that, however, without a robust fundraising effort. During redistricting, Democrats got a little too greedy in carving up the pie to safeguard themselves. The one thing they couldn’t draw lines around, though, was a changing electorate in which Democrats’ base narrowed to basically affluent, college-educated wine moms, while the Republicans became the party of the working class. CD9 can represent that coup – but only with the resources and national attention.
Joey Fox wrote a great story about what the Big Beautiful Bill might mean for New Jersey. How will the messaging work for both sides for the 2025 election?
Alex: What people hate most about politicians is that they feel they say one thing to get elected, only to turn around and do the complete opposite once they’re in office. In the One Big Beautiful Bill, there are no surprises from the campaign trail to Capitol Hill. The President promised “no taxes on tips or overtime,” funding immigration enforcement, reexamining SALT, making the 2019 Trump tax cuts permanent, and cleaning up waste, fraud, and abuse to protect safety net programs for the long run. That’s what this bill does.
Now, even if you reset Democrats back to their factory settings after a big loss in 2024, they are still programmed to run the “granny off the cliff” strategy in response to any proposed changes to Medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security. Other than “more,” there seems to be absolutely nothing you can suggest to Democrats that they would find acceptable in saving these programs from insolvency. We only seem to add things like discounted Amazon Prime memberships and cheaper Instacart runs – all paid for by the taxpayers. Contrary to the hysteria, this bill proposes relatively modest work requirements for only able-bodied Americans. At a time – thanks to Joe Biden’s inflationary policies – where most Americans are just one blown tire away from financial ruin, I don’t think much sympathy will be there for freeloaders. Even New Jersey Democrats are pleading with Mikie to change her focus on this bill.
The bottom line is that most New Jerseyans stand to benefit tremendously from this bill. The losers are people like Mikie Sherrill and Josh Gottheimer, who have whined about SALT every day for the last 7 years and enthusiastically applauded Kamala Harris’ theft of President Trump’s no taxes on tips or overtime idea, only to reflexively vote against it on partisan grounds. As someone who stares down a five-figure (and growing!) property tax bill every year, Mikie can shove it.
Dan The national Republican party cares, truly cares, about just one thing: cutting taxes for the rich and for corporations. They do this, invariably, at the expense of the poor and the middle class, making life worse for the vast majority of Americans so they can pay back their “donors” (they’re investors, really – they expect a direct ROI).
So once again, they make up a narrative about insolvency, and about illegal immigrants stealing medicaid and nutritional assistance, so they can con Americans into yet another wealth transfer from the 99% at the bottom to the top 1%. They reinstated an expiring SALT cap at a higher limit, claiming a pyrrhic victory for New Jersey taxpayers. Of course, if they had simply done nothing, there would be no SALT cap, so all they’ve done is continue our pain and suffering, but they’re hoping you’re too stupid to notice.
But here’s the good news: Americans weren’t fooled last time they did this in 2017 – Republicans paid a steep political price for years afterward. The same thing will happen now.
This story has been gnawing at me: a Rockaway Township man won a county committee seat, but the municipal clerk messed up and didn’t certify him, so he had no choice but to go to court. That cost him over $800, almost all of it on court filing fees and process servers. The judge didn’t order the town to reimburse him. Who’s right, me or the judge?
Dan: He should sue the town for the $800 to prove a point. Of course he should be reimbursed, and the clerk should apologize.
Alex: There is no excuse for this level of incompetence, and he should be reimbursed.
RELATED ARTICLES
-
February 7, 2025 -
-